skygiants

I've had occasion to rec Elatsoe twice this weekend for different reasons, once for someone asking for ace protagonists and a second time in a discussion of interesting loopholes in vampire lore .... "if a Native person uninvites a vampire from their traditional lands they HAVE TO GO" is the best play on the invite-only nature of vampires I've seen in years.

The worldbuilding in Elatsoe overall is extremely good and one of the standout elements of the book imo. It's set in a version of the U.S. that is Like Our Own but seamlessly assumes the public and mainstream existence of vampires, fairies, coyote people, etc. -- there's very little background scene-setting exposition and supernatural elements simply show up when they become relevant to the story, which allows the book to move without getting bogged down in its own mythology, but as with the vampires, everything that does appear gets integrated into the story in really neat and interesting ways. Also, by now I as many others probably have read many variants on 'immigrants bring their magic backstories to America byyyy which I mean I want to talk about fairies mostly' and it is extremely pleasant to read a version that's written by a Native author who is able to center Native stories and then pick and choose whatever else she wants to throw in for fun.

The plot itself focuses on Apache high schooler Ellie (short for Elatsoe, the name of her Six-Great Grandmother, from whom she inherited her ability to raise the dead) who finds herself tasked by her cousin's ghost with bringing his murderer to justice after he dies in a suspicious car accident.

Throughout the story, Ellie receives help from: her ghost dog; her best friend, Jay, who has extremely minor magic powers inherited from a fairy ancestor; her parents, who occasionally institute a temporary necromancy ban until Ellie can talk to a mentor but are overall extremely supportive; Jay's sister and her best friends from the basketball team; Jay's sister's boyfriend, a friendly college vampire bro; the ghosts of many, many trilobites; and, potentially, her Six-Great Grandmother.

Less helpful: the police, who are useless; Ellie's cousin's grieving widow, whose justifiable anger and sorrow are starting to impact her judgment a little when it comes to things like 'are raising revenge spirits a good idea'; and the picture-perfect town of Willowbee, which seems MUCH too green -- and too white -- for the region of Texas it inhabits.

I read this for my book group, and this ended up being the first book in months if not years that absolutely everybody liked. The content of the story is frequently pretty dark, but the writing and tone are warm and matter-of-fact rather than sinister; the plot moves quickly and the narrative treats all the characters like people worthy of concern and consideration. (Although Ellie herself is 17, the book feels to me like it's written more on the 12-13-ish-year-old edge of YA rather than the 17-18-year-old edge, but I don't think that's a bug.) I zoomed through the book in a day and would gladly read more.